3. Aurora supercomputers from Eurotech
• Aurora is the name of the Eurotech
liquid cooled supercomputers, which
excel in
• Computing power
• Density
• Energy efficiency
• Reliability
• Availability
• Compatibility
• Cost effectiveness
4. Why Aurora solutions?
High performance Scalability Reliability
and high density Linear scalability to users High quality
Fastest available from Gigaflops to Exaflops No moving parts and
technology for high density reduced hot spots
computational power
Compatibility and Green Competence
flexibility Aurora data centers HPC division expertise
Choice of interconnects consume 50% less power End to end solution
X86 based systems than data centers based on deployment
standard air cooled Flexibility to work with final
technology customer, SI and as OEM
5. High Performance and High Density
• Aurora uses the fastest Intel technology available
− Intel Xeon E5 (Sandy Bridge) on the latest Aurora HPC 10-10
− Optional GPU accelerators as part of the solution
• Fast Infiniband Interconnects
− Water cooled infiniband switches included in the systems (one every chassis)
• 3D Torus
− High speed up to 60 GB/sec 3D torus network based on FPGA
− In collaboration with research institutions like I.N.F.N, TNW and FBK, Eurotech has
developed one of the fastest and most reliable 3DTorus in the market
• FPGA accelerators
− Aurora nodes have an on-board FPGA that can be programmed as an accelerator
• High Density
– Aurora systems can pack 2 PetaFlops in just 30 m2, the size of a studio flat.
6. Scalability
• Hot pluggable modular system
– All components of the Aurora system are hot pluggable. Aurora can be scaled from a
single chassis with 16 nodes to multiple chassis in a rack and into a system with multiple
racks
• 3D torus network
− Next neighbor network with no switches and no bottlenecks facilitates scalability
• Infiniband
– Fast interconnections allow low latency communication
• Synchronization network
– Very fast channel and global commands with subdomain manageability
– Low/high level synchronization
7. Reliability
• Aurora provides the customers with no moving parts:
– There are no spinning discs and no fans for cooling on-board heat generating
components
– As a result, there are no vibrations that can harm memory and rotating discs,
increasing the longevity of components and, as a consequence, of the whole system.
• Aurora cooling limits hot spots
− Improved cooling infrastructure and direct to component heat removal allows uniformity
in heat production/removal, limiting hot spots and hence another cause of failures
• Monitoring and resilience
– Independent sensor networks
– Redundancy of all components including networks
– Choice of pro active support (preventive maintenance)
• Eurotech commitment to quality
– Eurotech produces its boards in its Japanese plant, following high quality standards
– Eurotech HPC selects the best in class supplier to set up the Aurora solutions
8. Flexibility and compatibility
• Choice of interconnects
– Aurora computational units offer both an Infiniband network and a 3D Torus
interconnection
– The customer can choose what is the best technology to be implemented accordingly
to the nature of the computational problem to be solved
• x86 based solution
– Aurora supercomputers are based on x86 processors
– Intel cluster ready certified
• A choice of software
– Aurora can run a vast variety of software, both open source and commercial
• A flexible solution approach
– Eurotech HPC can design solutions involving accelerators, storage and software,
according to customer requirements
9. Green and environmental
Everyone nowadays claims to be «green» – but are they?
Aurora Green proposition:
• Energy efficiency (achievable datacenter PUE of 1.05)
• Direct on component water cooling
• High reliability means less spare parts and hence less waste
• 230 AC to 10 V DC in 2 steps for a power conversion efficiency between
93% and 97%
• Free cooling (heat exchangers rather than chillers and AHU)
• Thermal energy recovery
• High density for floor space savings
• Noiseless operations means better work environments
10. Competence
• 10 years+ of HPC experience:
– An extended experience in top HPC projects
– Collaborated with best in class research center to develop advanced supercomputer
prototypes
– Developed experience in delivering large systems (15M$+)
• Structure and agility:
– Eurotech HPC division benefits from the structure coming from the Eurotech group,
while keeping the typical agility of a start up
– This means prompt adaptability to customer needs. Eurotech can deliver end to end
HPC solutions inclusive of supercomputers, storage, sotware and services. But they
can also work with system integrators, delivering parts of larger systems and as OEM
for larger vendors
• Financial solidity
– Differently from the pure HPC players in the market, Eurotech income statements
relies on multiple line of business, helping the HPC division to smooth revenues and to
rely on abundant resources
12. Data center TCO drivers
Driver Cost components
IT CAPEX Initial SW and HW capital expenditures
Space occupancy Cost of the occupied space and auxiliary infrastructure: rent,
(footprint) opportunity cost, civil, structural and engineering, permits and
taxes
Data center infrastructure Electrical (UPS, generator, cables…)
Cooling (Chillers, AHUs, heat exchangers, pumps…)
Installation Delivery costs, installation, test and tuning of IT, electrical and
cooling equipment
Energy Cost of energy: IT, cooling, lighting and waste
Maintenance and additional Warranty extensions, support, software licenses, IT maintenance,
operation costs electrical and cooling maintenance, facilities maintenance, costs
of outages, heating, security
Other: disposal, green Costs of end of life, carbon footprint (missed) incentives, fines…
13. Main Areas of Aurora systems impact on TCO
• Area 1: energy savings
– Lower costs due to energy cost optimization and better PUE
• Area 2: density (FLOPS/ m2)
– Aurora density allows for space, racks, electrical, cooling and network
savings
• Area 3: reliability
– Aurora reliability contributes to lower maintenance costs and outage
business costs
• Area 4: liquid cooling
– A part from the energy savings that water cooling implies, it also allows to
save on the capital costs of cooling infrastructure
16. TCO- energy
Energy savings
• Example of energy savings compared to 2 alternative air cooled solutions
• Rationale: less energy spent in cooling and less energy wasted in power
conversion.
Savings compared to an air Savings compared to an air
cooled 1U servers based cooled blade servers based
data centre data centre
(PUE = 2.13) (PUE = 1,6)
Total energy savings in
5 years compared to € 2,820,000 € 1,200,000
alternative solutions
17. TCO - density
+ IT hardware
+ costs, like racks
servers
+ network,
electrical and
+ electrical cooling hardware
costs
LESS
Flops/m2 + maintenance
+ cooling costs
+ space + energy costs
occupancy (m2)
+ raised floor
+ volume costs
occupancy(m3)
+ civil, structural
and engineering
costs
18. TCO - reliability
N is related to
density
The indirect impact depends on organisation and could range from thousands to
millions € per hour of outage.
So the impact of low reliability on the business could offset any saving reached
during purchase and installation of IT solutions!
19. TCO – liquid cooling
Adopting liquid cooling technology, it is possible to avoid most of air conditioning
used to cool the IT equipment
This bear some saving coming from the avoidance of chillers, AHU, CFD
(computational fluid dynamics), raised floor, air conditioning tuning
Liquid cooling infrastructure is generally cheaper relying on components like
piping, pumps and free coolers.
If we take a 1 MW installation and we consider a cost of air cooling infrastcrure of
3000$/KW, the toal cooling would be 3M$.
The same 1MW data center would probably require roughly 10% of that
expenditure
20. TCO example: comparison among 3 systems (500 Tflops)*
Different processors are used
Air cooled 1U servers Air cooled blade server Liquid cooled blade server
Processor Xeon 5600 Xeon 5600 Xeon E5
Cost of energy $2,720 $1,560 $510
Retuning and additional CFD $17 $6 $0
Total outage cost $500 $390 $160
Preventive maintenance $150 $150 $150
Annual facility and infrastructure
maintenance. $670 $380 $130
Lighting $14 $5 $2
Annualized 3 years capital costs $3,520 $3,250 $3,040
Annualized 10 years capital costs $1,770 $1,100 $440
Annualized 15 years capital costs $380 $120 $30
ANNUALIZED TCO (K od USD) $9,741 $6,961 $4,462
The best air cooled competitive solution has to be 100% cheaper to match TCO!!!
The standard air cooled competitive solution has to be 75% cheaper to match TCO!!!
*Calculations assume that cost of hardware and software is the same in the 3 cases
21. TCO example: comparison among 3 systems (500 Tflops)*
Same processors are used
Air cooled 1U servers Air cooled blade server Liquid cooled blade server
Processor Xeon 5600 Xeon 5600 Xeon 5600
Cost of energy $1,690 $1,560 $910
Retuning and additional CFD $14 $6 $0
Total outage cost $390 $390 $330
Preventive maintenance $150 $150 $150
Annual facility and infrastructure
maintenance. $450 $390 $240
Lighting $11 $5 $2
Annualized 3 years capital costs $3,390 $3,270 $3,220
Annualized 10 years capital costs $1,100 $1,100 $820
Annualized 15 years capital costs $300 $130 $40
ANNUALIZED TCO (K od USD) $7,495 $7,001 $5,712
The best air cooled competitive solution has to be 55% cheaper to match TCO!!!
The standard air cooled competitive solution has to be 40% cheaper to match TCO!!!
*Calculations assume that cost of hardware and software is the same in the 3 cases
